Lind, Karin

Messages in Change : A study on the internal communication at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (English)

Abstract [en]

This thesis tries to explore how different strategies of internal communication are used in actual situations within an organization. Specifically, the purpose is to investigate how the internal communication within the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) has been carried out during their work to change their organizational structure, and, how this can be understood in terms of existing theories for strategic communication. The research questions explored are:

What are the chosen strategies used to communicate the changes internally?

How can these strategies be understood in terms of existing theories?

What are the views of the employees on the communication and what are the relations between their views, the chosen strategies and existing theories?

The theoretical ground work chosen is mainly the work by Cornelissen (2008), Dalfelt (2005), Johansson (2011) and Larsson (2008). The method chosen for the empirical part of the study is semi-structured qualitative interviews. In total, eight interviews were performed. The interviewees were three senior employees in the communication department, one high ranking administrative officer with firsthand knowledge of the discussions performed in the board of the university and four employees with no direct connection to either the communication department or the board.

The main findings are that the planned communication is focused on making sure that the employees feel informed about the change process and that they feel included in the process. Also, the planned communication is meant to increase the employees’ acceptance and understanding of the need for change and to strengthen the dialogue between management and employees. To achieve these goals, the communication department has not explicitly used any existing theories in their planning process. However, the resulting plans bear resemblance to some key elements in existing theory. For instance, focus on dialogue and feedback are central in several modern accounts in the field, such as Clampitt’s ‘underscore and explore’ strategy. All of the interviewees felt informed about relevant facts but only a few felt as though they were part of the process. The remaining interviewees expressed that they still had unanswered questions and that the concerns of the employees were not fully recognized by the management. As a general conclusion, contrary to the expressed strategies of the communication department, most employees’ descriptions of the actual communication bear more resemblance to a ‘tell and sell’ strategy, rather than an ’underscore and explore’.